The Feel Before the Fall
by SoraGirl
Summary: "It was hope. The kind of blind, optimistic, unyielding, hope that Ben would later be sure could never survive anywhere outside the foolish, naive dreams of an 18 year old boy mayor...Until, of course, he met Leslie Knope." Ben/Leslie.


Disclaimer: Don't own Parks and Rec, sadly.

_**The Feel Before The Fall**_

Ben Wyatt was familiar with the feel before the fall.

He'd felt it first at nine, when by the big, dirt hill that was the tallest in their tiny town, his older brothers had taunted him just one too many times. It started out only as an inkling, more a spark than something certain. But, as sparks often do, it caught onto something and from there began exponentially to spread. Within moments "...could I show them?" had become "This'll show 'em" and Benjy had started walking his bike toward the hill.

When his brothers realized he might actually go through with it, they immediately repented (granted, it was only thanks to the foresight that their mother might murder them if they brought there little brother back in pieces). They shouted after him:

"Benjy, don't!"

"We were kidding!

"You're gonna get us all in trouble!"

"Can I have your Gameboy once you're dead!"

Of course, as Ben would learn, and even as he felt to be true then, that was all part of it: the doubt, the naysayers, the second guessing. It made it that much more thrilling and nerve wrecking and heart pounding and just, _real_. There was something in the uncertainty and in the fact that he was still moving towards it, not running away. In the back of his head he would start to hear some of his father's frequently repeated adages playing on a loop. Things like: "Your cowardice is all that stands between you and your success" and "The best moments in life are the ones that are most challenging to reach."

They were the same sayings that he'd repeated to himself a whole lifetime later, when he'd seen the first flicker of that feeling again at the breakfast table on the morning he turned 18. Blurry and groggy eyed, still in his Boba Fett pajamas, he had been greeted in the kitchen by his far-too-awake-for-7-am mother, who issued him a cheerful "Happy Birthday!", a tight hug, and then a heaping plate of birthday waffles.

"How old are you now?" his father asked, eyes moving briefly from his paper to his youngest son, now seated beside him.

"Uh, eighteen, Dad," Ben said, taken back by (what he considered to be anyway) a markedly increased amount of interest being taken in him by his father.

"Eighteen," he repeated, eyes already back on his paper. He flipped the page. "Old enough to run for office."

And just like that, it was back-that tiny, excited glimmer of possibility, that feeling of "What if?" and "Just Maybe!" It was the flicker that in following months would ignite a full blown campaign. It was the fuel that would drive him to get signatures and canvas neighborhoods and stay up late on school nights prepping for debates. And it only got stronger from all the "Drop out now!"s, "You have no chance!"s, and "What are you thinking?"s.

It was hope—hope that he could really make a positive difference, hope that he might, for once, make his father proud. It was blind, optimistic, unyielding, hope that Ben would later be certain could never survive anywhere outside the foolish, naive dreams of an 18 year old boy mayor.

Until, of course, he met Leslie Knope.

At 35, almost a full 18 years later, he should have known to be worried, he should have remembered what happened the last time he'd put a lifetime of distance between a climb and a fall. But how could he have ever possibly anticipated there'd be someone who could make him _want_ to hope again?

But there it was—that little hint of something bigger, a quick flash he'd spotted somewhere in her fearlessness. He had tried to fight it, to ignore it, to pretend like he had it under control, but before he knew it, he was in the parking lot of a public library, trying to bribe a children's entertainer to get in his car. Because, well, she was Leslie Knope, and just like that he was nine again, with enough hope to believe he could really make it down that hill. He was an eighteen year old idealistic optimist, putting it all on the line for some big, risky, nonessential project, and getting his stomach tied in knots just by the smallest sidelong glances from a girl.

In hindsight, he should have known then what was coming. He should have been running away or, at the very least, bracing for the impact. But that was the whole thing with that first part-the buildup, the climb. Believing (for whatever crazy reason he could come up with) that this time was somehow, someway going to be different, no matter how similar it felt—well, that was the whole nature of the game.

And so, with Leslie, Ben had managed to convince himself that as long as he remained in limbo, wanting but not having, dreaming but not acting, they'd be safe. After all, that first part was more like a prequel to the feeling he was afraid of than the feeling itself. If the fall was lighting, then the feeling to fret was thunder, and what he was feeling, well, that was just the gathering of clouds. As long as he didn't go all in, as long as he hadn't felt the thunder, he was safe, he had had time-

That was, at least until today. Today, when had begun to feel that distant, ominous rumbling, when out of something new he'd found something familiar, when he'd recognized it without a doubt: the feel before the fall.

It was in those, few, brief, breathless, precious seconds a little less than halfway down the hill, when he thought not just that he could do this, but that if he only pedaled just a little harder, surely he could fly.

It was in that screaming, hugging, whirling blur of disbelief and congratulations when the announcement was first made, like something electric caught all up inside him, like he was living the dream.

And then, on the last day of the Harvest Festival, after all they'd worked so hard on had been packed up and moved away, and he had taken Leslie back to her place and she had told him to wait right there while she ran inside to grab the jacket that he' wrapped around her two nights earlier when they'd been watching the fireworks and she seemed like she might be cold. He took the jacket from her and placed it in his car ( though he'd really wanted her to keep it and she'd really hadn't wanted to give it away) and then, they had stood there, Ben leaning awkwardly against the passenger-side door, Leslie standing a safe distance away.

There was a long, empty silence until Leslie, in voice sounding just barely better than defeated, said, "Well.. I guess this is it."

They locked eyes, and another several silent seconds passed, Neither spoke or moved. Then out of what seemed to be the clear blue sky, whatever had been holding them back shattered in one single, unanimous instance, and they crashed into each other at equal speed.

And there it was-

It was that frantic, heart-pounding, pulling, pushing, halfmasked glee, when suddenly her legs were wrapped around his waist and she was panting in-between kisses, "House. Now." And he was struggling to carry her and not stop kissing her and somehow still open the door.

It was all he'd been wanting for weeks in a slow motion fast forward freeze frame. It was the multilayered incredibleness of what was happening, and with who, and what that all meant and when amidst all the panting and the sweating, gasping, he stole away one sober moment to just _see_ her, to recognize that the woman he was with was the same, unbelievable, wonderful, adorable girl he'd been pining after since he'd first arrived in Pawnee, and to think that, _holy shit_, somehow that girl had wanted him, and _Jesus Christ_, this was all actually happening.

And it was the contained thrill of content bliss in waking up beside her the next morning, in knowing, at least in for that moment, she was maybe all his and maybe all he needed. It was that far off, hazy possibility that he could honestly imagine he might never get tired of this.

But when his mind strayed like that, considered a point any further down the timeline, he began instantly to fall. He felt again the same sharp cut from every rock that slashed him when he'd come smashing down that hill, crashing to the bottom to lay a tangled heap of bike and boy and rock and blood and dirt and broken bone. He heard his classmates cackling through impeachment proceedings and the taunts and jeers and hatred of his whole home town. He remembered Cindy Eckerd washing her hands of him, and his mother crying as she grounded him, his father in his recliner, faced the other way-refusing to speak to or even look at him.

He wanted to block it all out, Ice Town, the bike, the hill, his father, Indianapolis, the way the slowly spreading light across Leslie's sheets was proof time would only keep moving forward. But _shit_, what had he been thinking? _Shit_. He was going down again, and now he was going to drag Leslie down with him. Suddenly he was sure it would be better for them both he was absolutely anywhere else but there. He sat up quietly and slowly, inching one leg off of the bed.

Leslie stirred, let out a large yawn, and turned to stare at him, sitting straight up besides her, one foot off the bed, looking terribly distressed.

"Oh, hey, I—uh, is it okay that I'm—" he stammered, as unsure if it was okay for him to still be there as he was if it was okay for him to leave.

She couldn't help it-it was just something about the absolute bewilderment all over his face-she burst into tiny, tired giggles. "You are _such_ a nerd." With all the effort she had available, she stretched up halfway and offered his lips a soft, sweet reassurance. "Now come back to bed," she mumbled sleepily as she took his hand in hers and she pulled his arm around her, curling back up on her side.

For the first time in his life, Ben Wyatt considered that the feeling might just be worth the fall.


End file.
